maybe the 4th best conservative college blog in America in 2008

From Jim Geraghty at Campaign Spot, his friend, the man they call “Obi-Wan.” Let the Democrats and moderates get their poll-predicting information from complex statistical modeling and empirical evidence. As for me, I’ll take the word of a Star Wars hero:

Look, the real drama to this election is being provided not by the candidates but the polling community. By which I mean the decision they made to stake out â€” as Campaign Spot has noted â€” a remarkably bold position, that the Democratic Party turnout is not only going to exceed a recent historic advantage of 4 percent but go to 6.5 percent (Rasmussen) to 8 percent in many polls to even 12 percent in one.

I keep looking for the justification for this. Not easy to find. Rather like the academics’ one-time belief in the Aristotlean spheres and an earth-centered universe, it just seems to be a pretty good working theory â€” some sort of way to make sense of observable phenomena and keep all the smart people talking agreeably and pleasantly among themselves.

[…]

In the old days the networks had political directors like Marty Plissner and Hal Bruno who kept an eye on the tendency to politicize the number-crunchers. What happens when that sort of internal check is lost was evidenced by the spectacular embarrassment â€“ the debacle â€” of the exit polls in 2004. (Obi ) The polite explanation was that the skewing resulted from the fact that Democratic voters are more likely to talk to polling representatives at the polls. What got buried was the fact studies found that the cultural-political backgrounds of the exit-poll employees was a big factor.

Anyway, back in the days when exit polls were reliable â€” if a first or second wave of numbers were seen similar to the McCain-Obama battleground polls that came out today the network insiders would have been saying: hold everything, this is a very close one. (That’s because they usually wacked two or three points off the Democrats’ total since urban areas get better represented in the exit polls.)

So, if the polling community is basically right in their turnout models, this is looking like ’64 â€” a nightmare scenario for the GOP. But if they are off to any significant degree, the state polls seen today (even though some of them favor a high Dem turnout model) make this a very different race. And what about the outlier polls in Pennsylvania and even one in Minnesota showing a close race?

And there are other questions. What about the reaction to media bias (Obamamania, the resentment towards Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber) driving up Republican turnout? What about the extent to which Reagan Democrats in Florida are being urged to the polls by the McCain campaign?

And the reason that the polling community, not to mention the Obama campaign should be uneasy is that finding the justification for their heavy Democratic weighting isn’t readily accessible. And that is the point â€“ along with failing to themselves take note that in this period of unprecedented economic turmoil and therefore any predictions this year might be questionable or at least hugely complicated, the pollsters and media gurus never really put their own premises about voter turnout front and center and asked for questions, objections and evaluations.

They seem to have slipped into a world of easy assumptions. Always dangerous for those whose job is to quantify and track the stars and planets of an ever-changing, ever-moving political universe.

If, like me, you’d prefer not to see America elect the most liberal-left President in modern history, with Pelosi controlling the House, and Reid the Senate, thereby enabling them to make us Canada Jr., how about a little GOTV?

(no offense to my Canadian readers)

We’re close and closing. And anyway, nobody knows what to expect with the polls this year. They were wildly inaccurate during the primaries and they’ve been all over the place the last few weeks. The word “volatile” comes to mind.

Whether you are in a Battleground state for McCain, California for Proposition 8, or Washington State for Dino Rossi, volunteer a little time and make some calls or pound the pavement and visit some Republicans & undecideds.

PUT JOHN McCAIN & SARAH PALIN IN THE WHITE HOUSE?

PASS PROPOSITION 8?

GET DINO ROSSI ELECTED?

MAINTAIN A FILIBUSTER IN THE SENATE?

YES WE CAN!!!!!1!!!

UPDATE 31 October 12:45pm BST: A little research has revealed an interesting fact: During the primaries, Barack Obama performed, on average, 2.8 points worse than he polled in the 3 days leading up to the election.

Call this whatever you want, I call this hope we can believe in.

Also, be sure and check out the Iowahawk post I linked to earlier today. His explanation of the statistics behind polling should also provide a bit of optimistic comfort.

Finally, I don’t know how I missed this before: For all those of you who, like me, can’t get to a McCain camp calling center, for whatever reason, click here, to sign up to make calls online. Even if you can only do it for 15 mins–do it. Do it for 15 mins every day from now until the election.

– California w/Prop 8 and the fact that so many of you are from there and can call out.– Pennsylvania. Yep, I was surprised too. There are quite a few of you PA readers. And you live in a hotly contested state.– Virginia – We’ll see if this traditionally red state is really going to go for Obama. In fact, this will be an early bellweather on election night. You readers get out and do your job: make calls for McCain.– Washington – Do what you can for Dino Rossi and make calls into other states.– I think there’s a Georgia Victory Center listed in there somewhere too. Lots of Georgia readers. Thanks, guys.

Anyway, thanks to Fernando M. for hosting the spreadsheet with all the info. Click here to download and get to work.

If, like me, you’d prefer not to see America elect the most liberal-left President in modern history, with Pelosi controlling the House, and Reid the Senate, thereby enabling them to make us Canada Jr., how about a little GOTV?

(no offense to my Canadian readers)

We’re close and closing. And anyway, nobody knows what to expect with the polls this year. They were wildly inaccurate during the primaries and they’ve been all over the place the last few weeks. The word “volatile” comes to mind.

Whether you are in a Battleground state for McCain, California for Proposition 8, or Washington State for Dino Rossi, volunteer a little time and make some calls or pound the pavement and visit some Republicans & undecideds.

PUT JOHN McCAIN & SARAH PALIN IN THE WHITE HOUSE?

PASS PROPOSITION 8?

GET DINO ROSSI ELECTED?

MAINTAIN A FILIBUSTER IN THE SENATE?

YES WE CAN!!!!!1!!!

UPDATE 31 October 12:45pm BST: A little research has revealed an interesting fact: During the primaries, Barack Obama performed, on average, 2.8 points worse than he polled in the 3 days leading up to the election.

Call this whatever you want, I call this hope we can believe in.

Also, be sure and check out the Iowahawk post I linked to earlier today. His explanation of the statistics behind polling should also provide a bit of optimistic comfort.

Finally, I don’t know how I missed this before: For all those of you who, like me, can’t get to a McCain camp calling center, for whatever reason, click here, to sign up to make calls online. Even if you can only do it for 15 mins–do it. Do it for 15 mins every day from now until the election.

– California w/Prop 8 and the fact that so many of you are from there and can call out.– Pennsylvania. Yep, I was surprised too. There are quite a few of you PA readers. And you live in a hotly contested state.– Virginia – We’ll see if this traditionally red state is really going to go for Obama. In fact, this will be an early bellweather on election night. You readers get out and do your job: make calls for McCain.– Washington – Do what you can for Dino Rossi and make calls into other states.– I think there’s a Georgia Victory Center listed in there somewhere too. Lots of Georgia readers. Thanks, guys.

Anyway, thanks to Fernando M. for hosting the spreadsheet with all the info. Click here to download and get to work.

The media polls are heavily weighted towards Democrats in terms of Party ID. With that kind of heavy weighting, it would be impossible for McCain to show any lead even if he had a small led among independents. For example, Rasmussen currently assumes the following party id break down: Democrats 40%, Republicans 32.8%, and Independents 27.2%. He is assuming a whopping 7 percent advantage in party id for the Democrats. This is a big barrier to overcome in these polls. If we assume a 85% Democrat support for Obama and 85% Republican support for McCain and a 50/50 breakdown among independents (ignore undecided and third party candidates) this would translate to a poll finding of 52.5% for Obama and 47.5% for McCain which incidentally gives the same 5% spread as in the current Rasmussen poll.

Note that all of this is simply from the 7% party id advantage. If we reduce the party id spread to 3%, the numbers would change to 51% for Obama and 49% to McCain. Now if we assume that McCain picks off more Democrats than Obama does Republicans, 85% Democrats for Obama and 90% Republicans for McCain then the outcome will be 49.3% for Obama and 50.7% for McCain, a clear LEAD.

What this simple analysis shows is that there are two crucial things for McCain victory:

a) HIGH Republican turnout.

b) HIGH PUMA (Democrats against Obama) turnout.

I strongly believe that both are very achievable. It all comes down to TURNOUT, GOTV, and ENTHUSIASM. This is why Obama and his media acolytes are working overtime to demorialize and suppress the turnout among Republicans and PUMAs. We have to keep working hard, ignore their propaganda, and get out and vote.

One final thing. Rasmussen has been steadily increasing his Dem party id advantage over the last three months. I suspect the same with other pollsters working for major media news organizations. However, the Republican base and the PUMAs are as energized as the Dem base and may in fact be even more energized. In addition to this, if last minute deciders go overwhelmingly against Obama as happened during the Democratic primaries in the swing states, McCain should win by an even bigger margin. The media and their pollsters are in for a huge surprise.

From an ex-Democrat turned independent supporting McCain/Palin ’08.

Come on folks, join me in making the calls for McPalin. Click the link and copy and paste it and mail it to all your McPalin-supportin’ friends and family. Write up a note in Facebook and paste a link there encouraging your friends to do the same. Make it your status on Facebook or MySpace.

If, like me, you’d prefer not to see America elect the most liberal-left President in modern history, with Pelosi controlling the House, and Reid the Senate, thereby enabling them to make us Canada Jr., how about a little GOTV?

(no offense to my Canadian readers)

We’re close and closing. And anyway, nobody knows what to expect with the polls this year anyway. They were wildly inaccurate during the primaries and they’ve been all over the place the last few weeks.

Whether you are in a Battleground state for McCain, California for Proposition 8, or Washington State for Dino Rossi, volunteer a little time and make some calls or pound the pavement and visit some Republicans & undecideds.

If you have information on GOTV efforts in your area, email me with the relevant details and I’ll pass them along.

PUT JOHN McCAIN & SARAH PALIN IN THE WHITE HOUSE?PASS PROPOSITION 8?GET DINO ROSSI ELECTED?MAINTAIN A FILIBUSTER IN THE SENATE?

YES WE CAN!!!!!1!!!

UPDATE 31 October 12:45pm BST: A little research has revealed an interesting fact: During the primaries, Barack Obama performed, on average, 2.8 points worse than he polled in the 3 days leading up to the election.

Call this whatever you want, I call this hope we can believe in.

Also, be sure and check out the Iowahawk post I linked to earlier today. His explanation of the statistics behind polling should also provide a bit of optimistic comfort.

Finally, I don’t know how I missed this before: For all those of you who, like me, can’t get to a McCain camp calling center, for whatever reason, click here, to sign up to make calls online. Even if you can only do it for 15 mins–do it. Do it for 15 mins every day from now until the election.

UPDATE 1 November 2:08am BST: I got the information I referred to above. I narrowed down from the Top 10 states in terms of visits to OL&L to the states that could impact things. They are:

– California w/Prop 8 and the fact that so many of you are from there and can call out.– Pennsylvania. Yep, I was surprised too. There are quite a few of you PA readers. And you live in a hotly contested state.– Virginia – We’ll see if this traditionally red state is really going to go for Obama. In fact, this will be an early bellweather on election night. You readers get out and do your job: make calls for McCain.– Washington – Do what you can for Dino Rossi and make calls into other states.– I think there’s a Georgia Victory Center listed in there somewhere too. Lots of Georgia readers. Thanks, guys.

Anyway, thanks to Fernando M. for hosting the spreadsheet with all the info. Click here to download and get to work.

If, like me, you’d prefer not to see America elect the most liberal-left President in modern history, with Pelosi controlling the House, and Reid the Senate, thereby enabling them to make us Canada Jr., how about a little GOTV?

(no offense to my Canadian readers)

We’re close and closing. And anyway, nobody knows what to expect with the polls this year anyway. They were wildly inaccurate during the primaries and they’ve been all over the place the last few weeks.

Whether you are in a Battleground state for McCain, California for Proposition 8, or Washington State for Dino Rossi, volunteer a little time and make some calls or pound the pavement and visit some Republicans & undecideds.

If you have information on GOTV efforts in your area, email me with the relevant details and I’ll pass them along.

PUT JOHN McCAIN & SARAH PALIN IN THE WHITE HOUSE?PASS PROPOSITION 8?GET DINO ROSSI ELECTED?MAINTAIN A FILIBUSTER IN THE SENATE?

YES WE CAN!!!!!1!!!

UPDATE 31 October 12:45pm BST: A little research has revealed an interesting fact: During the primaries, Barack Obama performed, on average, 2.8 points worse than he polled in the 3 days leading up to the election.

Call this whatever you want, I call this hope we can believe in.

Also, be sure and check out the Iowahawk post I linked to earlier today. His explanation of the statistics behind polling should also provide a bit of optimistic comfort.

Finally, I don’t know how I missed this before: For all those of you who, like me, can’t get to a McCain camp calling center, for whatever reason, click here, to sign up to make calls online. Even if you can only do it for 15 mins–do it. Do it for 15 mins every day from now until the election.

UPDATE 1 November 2:08am BST: I got the information I referred to above. I narrowed down from the Top 10 states in terms of visits to OL&L to the states that could impact things. They are:

– California w/Prop 8 and the fact that so many of you are from there and can call out.– Pennsylvania. Yep, I was surprised too. There are quite a few of you PA readers. And you live in a hotly contested state.– Virginia – We’ll see if this traditionally red state is really going to go for Obama. In fact, this will be an early bellweather on election night. You readers get out and do your job: make calls for McCain.– Washington – Do what you can for Dino Rossi and make calls into other states.– I think there’s a Georgia Victory Center listed in there somewhere too. Lots of Georgia readers. Thanks, guys.

Anyway, thanks to Fernando M. for hosting the spreadsheet with all the info. Click here to download and get to work.

In 2006, against the tide, I made calls via Skype using the RNC’s web page with voter information for various important Senate seats. (Yeah, I know how that turned out, smart-A’s.) Assuming I can find the link, I’ll be doing a lot more of the same all weekend and into the next week.

If, like me, you’d prefer not to see America elect the most liberal-left President in modern history, with Pelosi controlling the House, and Reid the Senate, thereby enabling them to make us Canada Jr., how about a little GOTV?

(no offense to my Canadian readers)

We’re close and closing. And anyway, nobody knows what to expect with the polls this year anyway. They were wildly inaccurate during the primaries and they’ve been all over the place the last few weeks.

I analyzed my analytics and discovered the Top 10 states visiting OL&L over the last year or so. I am in the process of getting info for McCain Victory 2008 campaign centers in the corresponding states. I’ll get back to you with that when I can.

Whether you are in a Battleground state for McCain, California for Proposition 8, or Washington State for Dino Rossi, volunteer a little time and make some calls or pound the pavement and visit some Republicans & undecideds.

If you have information on GOTV efforts in your area, email me with the relevant details and I’ll pass them along.

PUT JOHN McCAIN & SARAH PALIN IN THE WHITE HOUSE?PASS PROPOSITION 8?GET DINO ROSSI ELECTED?MAINTAIN A FILIBUSTER IN THE SENATE?

YES WE CAN!!!!!1!!!

UPDATE 31 October 12:45pm BST: A little research has revealed an interesting fact: During the primaries, Barack Obama performed, on average, 2.8 points worse than he polled in the 3 days leading up to the election.

Call this whatever you want, I call this hope we can believe in.

Also, be sure and check out the Iowahawk post I linked to earlier today. His explanation of the statistics behind polling should also provide a bit of optimistic comfort.

Finally, I don’t know how I missed this before: For all those of you who, like me, can’t get to a McCain camp calling center, for whatever reason, click here, to sign up to make calls online. Even if you can only do it for 15 mins–do it. Do it for 15 mins every day from now until the election.